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Sunday, 14 July 2013

Hot

... I tell you I spend all day ferryin' water to the vegetable plot.
I be picking the first sizeable pan of peas today... And the strawberries? There are lots and I have to make tiny batches of fresh jam to keep in the fridge to keep up with them. We do never get round to getting a freezer.

The garden has patches of waist-high grass which we call "wild areas"... and visitors call "hay-fever sumps". These have some powerful tall ant hills. This place have also attracted what seem like resident pairs of Ringlet butterflies. They flit around amongst the long grasses in a very floppy, summery manner.

The field over the lane has been cut and baled and I look out the window to see slow-moving parties of rooks browsing in the stubble for food ... The ground must be hard and dry now for food-hunting critters.

I'm too hot to move. But I must not stare into the mouth of that old gift horse. It's been a long time since we had this kind of summer.